Tremors Drabbles
by Kameka
Summary: just some drabbles I wrote years ago at work home, out.. who can remember now? that I'm just getting around to posting. May be updated in the future, but no idea really


**Tremors Drabbles**

Disclaimer: All standard disclaimers apply. The characters do not belong to me unless otherwise stated. No money has been made. If it was, do you really think I'd be wriitng fic when I could be tryin' to get the series back on TV???

Notes: A 'drabble' is a mini-ficlet that is exactly 100 words long. It can be in poetry form, story form, letter, etc. The only requirement is the length. I have Drabble files in a few other fandoms, also written at work. This will be like those. These drabbles can be with any of the characters from the films or the series, just to warn ya! I'll update every once in a while once I get (what I think is) a good amount.

Chances are that most of these will be written at work, since some nights it's too noisy (4 kids, a Playstation, a 42" TV, and the radio – to say nothing of customers!!!) for me to concentrate on writing a longer story. Hopefully you like them!

Also: some of these are parts of, or may be, the basis for stories that I have planned. After all, who knows what the muses will bring? These were partially written just to get them out of my head for a while so I could concentrate on something else. If anyone else would like to base a story on one of these… feel free! I'd just like to read the end result, if possible.

As the previous story posted in this section: these were written way back in '07, but I lost my flash drive. I know, bad writer! I found it, and thought I'd post it.

**Drabble # 1**

Jodie Chang touched the counter as she walked slowly through the general store that her grandfather had owned for more than half her life. It was hers now, Walter Chang dead from the monsters beneath the ground. This was a business where she could make her mark in ways she couldn't if she stayed in Los Angeles. Her parents thought she was insane, wanting to move to Perfection, Nevada, but it was just something she had to do. She couldn't explain it, other than to say she had to be there. Maybe she'd figure it out in the coming months.

**Drabble # 2**

Dust rose in a cloud behind the truck as she drove away from the only home she had known. The mid-day sun beat cruelly on the landscape, harsh against her shielded eyes as they strained to see and memorize every little detail. She was conflicted, part of her rejoicing at her escape even as another part yearned with homesickness already. Memories, both good and bad, swirled through her mind. Her mother laughing and gardening, absolute terror when nightmares came to life, and the sense of family she had with the town. It was home. She just couldn't stay there anymore.

**Drabble # 3**

He waited for the latest carload of tourists that would pay through the nose to take Desert Jack's tour for the chance to see a Real! Live! Graboid! There wasn't one, but it was definitely safer this way: no pesky life-and-death situations. And he hadn't truly lied, never truly advertising that there was one there currently. Nope, he'd been careful. The car pulled up and he ambled forward, a wide customer-service smile spreading across his face as the latest group spilled out. Time to start the performance. After all, they were all living Pinnochios. He just made money at it.

**Drabble # 4**

It was quiet, her husband out somewhere in the desert surrounding their home. He was spending more and more time out there, ever vigilant against the threats that could end their lives. Even when he was home with her… he wasn't. It hurt to be invisible. That was why she had stopped going out with him so often. Why put herself through being virtually ignored sitting in the seat next to him when she was as alone when home? She felt like a pair of old slippers, kept around because she was a comfortable fit. She deserved more than that.

**Drabble # 5**

She stood and stretched, wincing as her back protested the shift in position. She had been working for hours, bent over assorted pots as she shifted, watered, and generally took care of her garden, a wide assortment of plants. She was hot, the harsh desert sun beating down from overhead, cruel rays attempting to undo the loving care she'd been administering. It was a never-ending trial, trying to continue the lives of these pampered plants she'd brought here, but it was one of love. She had always adored living things, growing them… and moving here wasn't going to change that.

**Drabble # 6**

This was it. After ten long years, an entire decade of anticipation, he was ready. Never again would he be taken by surprise by those damned underground monsters. Never again would he have to scrabble for ideas and weapons and safety as he fought for his life. Never again would others look to him to provide for their own lives and futures… and be disappointed. Never again, he'd promised himself. And now he had kept that promise to himself. Now was the turning point, for him, for them, for everybody. This was it. He was ready to meet his destiny.

**Drabble # 7**

"Before we move this ahead, we have to be sure this is what we want."

"You're not sure?"

"I didn't say that! I said _we_ have to be sure this is what _we_ want."

"But why would you say that unless _you're_ not sure?"

"God, this is why I don't get into relationships…"

"I cannot believe that you…"

…

"Where'd you learn that?"

"Always worked before…thought it might work for you."

"I'm not sure I like you using tricks you learned with other women on me."

"Even if you reap the benefits?"

"Let me get back to you on that."

**Drabble # 8**

It was quiet in Perfection – it almost always was, except when the quiet was broken by fleeting times of mind-consuming terror that scarred your psyche and revisited you in your nightmares. But right now it was quiet, a gentle desert breeze lifting blonde hair as she leaned against the wooden wall of the general store. She shaded blue eyes with an uplifted hand, straining to see every little detail as she watched the man working on the car across the street in the harsh light. He was completely oblivious to the watching, ignoring the woman looking upon her heart's desire.

**Drabble # 9**

There was a monument hidden off to the side of town. Part of it could be considered normal, a list of residents that had fallen during times of disaster. Washington D.C. had a similar one, of soldiers' names carved in black granite in remembrance. This one was painted wood, originally white but now faded by the elements. It contained rows of names written in red script, dates beside them. The residents were by far the largest names, each neatly at the top. It was beneath the resident names that was the harder part, the one that no one wanted seen.

**Drabble # 10**

Las Vegas was loud, garish neon lights blinking and shimmering against a night sky unseen because of streetlights and headlights and towering hotels and casinos. This area was darker, with the crime of back alleys brought out to into the light by the free atmosphere. This was a world unto itself… a world of masks and illusions, of people hiding and keeping secrets; a world where someone could disappear. It was built on a carefully constructed house of cards and lies, waiting for the confessions that could topple it. Brute force from the chosen zealously guarded it against such confessions.

**Drabble # 11**

"What the hell do you want from me?" he shouted to the black velvet sky. He was alone. He would always be alone now.

"Didn't you take enough already? My home! My family! My work! My _life_!"

He fell to his knees on sand cooled by the night, ignoring the gritty texture beneath his skin; it had become roughened years ago, accustomed to the constant onslaught.

"Why did you have to take more?" he asked in a tortured whisper, unable to continue to feed the rage that had boiled through his veins at the actions of an unfair cosmos.

"Why?"

**Drabble # 12**

It moved through the grit, meandering its' way around its' home. It was the last of its' kind here; the others having been killed long ago by creatures that lived above the ground. It had been spared, for reasons unknown. It had been sentenced to being alone.

One of the creatures had played briefly, placing small noisy objects on the surface to be chased. That one and another ventured out of their safety often, moving around the land with the aid of things enticingly loud and fast moving.

Nothing changed the fact that it was here when it shouldn't be.

**Drabble # 13**

The trip was loud, noise the roaring of an engine primed for use mingling with a radio blaring against the roar of the wind. It was after he gassed up in Bixby that the apprehension set in. The road he was on was empty, completely devoid of human life. There was an occasional 'Danger!' sign and the posts of civilization stretching long fingers in front of him… but they became more worn as he passed them, as if they were abandoning hope the closer he got to his destination. He shrugged it off. Moving here was his choice, his chance.

**Drabble # 14**

The wooden floors creaked under her weight, the small noise making her freeze in her tracks before shivering and continuing forward. It was silly, a grown woman afraid of the natural noises an old house makes. Next she'd wake up from a nightmare, scared of a branch hitting her window in the darkness of the night. She shook her head. Utter foolishness. Her family had lived here before. She could live here now. She just had to be stronger. She laughed slightly at herself. It took more strength to live in a desert wasteland than in crowded civilization. Who knew?

**Drabble # 15**

"You just want to shut the world away!"

"I've always wanted to shut the world away, Heather."

"I know that. It's just…"

"Just what?"

…

"Heather?"

"When did _I_ become a part of the world that you wanted to shut away, Burt?"

"You aren't."

"Yes... I am. This… obsession of yours is coming between us. It's changin' you, honey."

"I'm still the same man you married, Heather."

"In some ways. But you used to put 'us' a lot higher up in your priorities. When did we get pushed off to the fringes, if we're thought of at all?"

"Heather, I…"

**Drabble # 16**

It was days like this that she felt like moving, her psyche yearning for some tropical paradise instead of the wasteland she lived in. She immediately felt bad; this wasn't a true wasteland. The town did, well, not thrive, but survive. Sometimes she felt like doing more! She wanted to thrive instead of just existing. She wanted to lie back one day on the beach, an endless blue sky above her and a drink with a pink paper umbrella next to her. She dreamt of it at night, escaping her life and travelling. And every morning she woke up here.

**Drabble # 17**

Her friends asked her why she would want to move to Perfection, studying Mixmaster and the Graboid christened by the locals as El Blanco when she could work in safety. They didn't understand the draw of frontier life; she ostensibly answered to the government, but she was truly on her own for a great majority of it. She was like a cowboy of old, relying on herself and her friends, her gut instincts responsible for survival. The sense of camaraderie that she was on the fringes of… but still felt a part of. They turned to her for the answers.


End file.
